Hook, Line and Sinker
by chakramrain
Summary: Samantha Puckett is a tough, lazy, stupid drifter and coattail-rider. She isn't the garbage man. She doesn't waste perfectly good burritos. She definitely does not accept hugs from overly smiley people on pink bicycles. However, Caterina Valentine becomes the first, not only, but perhaps last exception without her empty skull understanding that 'gay' doesn't always mean 'happy'.
1. A Prologue to the Symphony

It's just because Samantha Puckett has lost her best friend and Caterina Valentine believes that the parents and brother have gone on a year-long vacation. There are beds. There are two. Sam's is a cobalt-and-dark sort of garish and a few half-chewed ribs probably jut out from the cushioning. Cat's is pink, glittery and too bright for the sun. After all, Cat has always been too bright for anyone.

And Sam is not a hugger. She's not a tree-hugger. She's not a person-hugger. But she's a Cat hug-pole and that is, not admittedly, quite all right with her. It's the blonde and the red running together and hitting some bull's-eye of warped perfection as they give up the beds and stick their butts into the ugly yellow couch. And Sam hardly remembers to mention Carly.

Being unaware, unacceptable and untaken is the staple diet of yesterday's Samantha Puckett. She's been taken in; she lives in a home of a misfit who took her in and she in turn took the redheaded young lady in. And if she can, she'll put her arms around the other and keep her from the colourful snacks for as long as she can, just as she kept Carly from terrible boys and _Freddie._ Sam shudders at the thought and reminds herself that the façade was for reassurance that she'd been normal.

Was gay 'normal'?

"Being happy is wonderful, Sam!"

"Not _that _kind of 'gay', Cat," Sam attempts an exhausted tone but she falls flat as she lets out a snort and a reluctant smile in response to the very Cat-like answer.

But she'll get through it. Cat isn't attractive in the physically frustrating manner. She is physically attractive, she is, but it's the sparkle in her eyes when she expects an embrace that catches Sam off guard every time, because Sam's always had walls built around her, wooden poles at the ready and arrows stocked in the arsenal. And so she noticed and continues to notice the armour on every soldier, hiding battle-scars and scrapes. Never do persons like Caterina Valentine stroll along (or pedal cheerfully along on a blindingly pink bicycle) into lives to brighten them or, in Sam's case, disrupt, interrupt and then rescue.

With that smile absolutely needing bars and protection, Sam hasn't gotten actual rest in the past week, though she sleeps for three quarters of the day daily. And every moment her eyelids are clipped up is another inch the hook digs into her chest, carefully ensuring no room for escape. Fortunately Sam isn't attempting one just yet. There's too much bacon in the refrigerator to walk out on everything.

Sam watches Cat surf the channels with the remote and realises she hasn't let another person pick their show for about… _forever._ She's about to bring her palm to her cheek at the thought, but sighs loudly at Cat's choice of movie: the 'My Little Pony' marathon is what it is, of course.

"Do we have to watch this?" Sam groans, snuggling closer anyway.

Cat almost pouts.

"Okay, let's watch this thing."

Samantha also has it dawned on her that she hasn't pulled a con, trick or hoodwink upon Caterina Valentine at all for these two weeks. In fact, she'd pulled the idiot from a garbage truck, thrown a perfectly good burrito away to do so, stolen sets and props, driven an old Italian lady to an elderly home, hugged and wiped tears away all in honour of the other female. And Cat was just too _stupid_ to see any of it.

Thank the Lord.

She knows no one will come looking for her. Maybe they'll try to sell the motorcycle to the bank. Maybe her mother will get another underage boyfriend and get to prison through more jailbait. And then the drugs will be on her tail as her primitive mates hit the streets in utter despondence. And then she'll hold on to Cat's pink sweater and tell her to hold her too.

Because it'll work.

_Just like it did with Carly,_ Sam thinks.

But she's already fallen, so what's the issue? She's gone for it all, hook, line and sinker.


	2. The Sealed and Locked Away

"What's for dinner today?"

"We're having goat."

"Goat!" Cat erupts into a cheer, "why goat?"

"I put Dice's in a blender," Sam chucks her thumb over to the contraption of death, the blender, mostly chunky white bits and splats of red marking the glass.

"Oh."

Sam waits as she always does. It's always enjoyable to observe expressions evolving on her roommate's face. The idea of reeling Cat in to take a closer look is ever-present, thumping in her chest and churning badly in her loins.

"It's dead?" Cat asks cautiously.

"It is indeed."

Cat explodes into a fit of mental trauma. Sometimes Sam suspects she's epileptic or just emotionally unsound. However, she cuts the joke short quickly this time in favour of a kiss on the cheek by announcing that dinner is turkey and strawberry jam, really.

She had not really prepared herself for the peck, though, because now she is at a standstill, watching things race about her as Cat leans back, just ten times happier at the truth. Samantha catches herself with a knuckle grazing Cat's tan cheek.

The redhead gazes upwards, "hmm?"

The hand is withdrawn at a bolt of lightning.

"I thought you had something there."

She hates lunches alone. She doesn't like the children very much. She doesn't enjoy flicking the television on and off as much any longer. Sometimes she stares at the clock. And then she has to recall which numbers come before which. Sam swings her legs back and forth on wooden stools as she waits for the door to open once more every day.

In the evenings Sam and Cat spend time the way either likes, bouncing on beds and telling stories about unicorns or going on rides, hair streaking in the wind. But Sam ensures that Cat straps on the helmet whenever she throws her leg swiftly over the leather padded seating.

Sam dumps the contents, dinner, from the blender onto two plates and puts an eyebrow up at Cat before taking a massive spoonful and grunting peacefully. Cat does not mirror the expression and instead chokes on her mouthful and forces herself to swallow.

Dinner is done and both do the dishes, Sam being the first to throw a wet sponge upon Cat, who stares, open-mouthed in shock.

"Hey!" she scrunches her face into a distorted bungle, "that wasn't nice."

Sam only tilts her head to the right, picking up the sponge and repeating the previous action.

"Don't you like water-fights?"

"What?"

"Water-fights, Cat, do you like them?"

Cat shakes her head rapidly, "they don't seem nice."

"You haven't had one, now have you?" Sam huffs, putting her soapy hands into the pockets of her jeans and removing them to scoop water from the tap and patting it down on Cat's back, "just like you haven't watched a boxing match or gone to watch baseball."

"I have _so!_"

Sam steps forward, poised just behind the hunched figure in front of the washing basin. She rests her hands on the protruding hips that form just the right curves and puts her cheekbone to Cat's head, mumbling incoherent nonsense.

"Tell you what, you need to skip school for a day. The psychologically unstable and balding man is too obsessed with coconuts to care, anyway. We should do things; this is _Los Angeles_."

"Like have sleepovers!"

"Cat, we live in the same house."

"Right."

There is a pause before Cat gasps in horror.

"That's truancy!"

"You mean doing something fun."

"It's bad!" Cat protests, almost turning around in Sam's grasp to display the emotions of bewilderment and dismay.

Sam's nose-bridge nudges at the crown of Cat's blazing red hair, smoothing the strands backwards and taking in a scent redolent of peaches and lilies. Cat happens to smell inviting eternally and as Sam internalises the intensifying texture of the scent, her mind is clouded with reasons to agree with the shorter.

However, Sam's gentle caresses win the day.

"Fine, but just once. We'll wear sunglasses and tall hats out."

"And look even more conspicuous; good job, Cat!" Sam pipes up sardonically.

"Thanks!" Cat claps as the sarcasm is completely lost on her.

"Never mind."

And like this they tumble into abhorrent slumber as Sam loses sight on stability and utter lunatic business. Cat is both in one. When she walks into Sam's line of vision she's the picture of perfect innocence and naïve happiness present for about two seconds into her own birth and when she opens her mouth she sends Sam into a whirlpool of feelings that toss, turn, flip themselves over and then blanch themselves silently as Sam swivels her head elsewhere.

The palpitating thews having spasms within her shift into an erratic beat and Sam prays for a rhythm because there are only so many things two can do in twenty-four hours and one billion Cat hasn't done. Then again, once in a while Cat drops the curtains to another world Sam hasn't seen yet, miles away from her monochromatic one.

Cat has odd dabs of paint here and there in her realm, and she shows Sam things like family dinners and colourful creatures. She's perfectly wounded and she hardly knows. Sam's terribly wounded and the ache in the raw things is amplified everywhere but in the safe-house where Cat is.

There is a sense of serenity about the evening and Sam waits for Cat to fall into dreamland before she dares to shut her eyes fully. She sleeps in peace.


	3. From Which I Could Fall

Sam's ideas of fun are Cat's ideas of not. But then, it's all okay because Sam's elbows are tucked into her angular hipbones, nestled in the flesh just there. In pure, unadulterated excitement Sam snorts crudely as she lets the rainbow of translucent plastic fly, encapsulated gulps of water hitting targets and more of the sidewalk.

"The rooftop is nice," comments Cat, for lack of better things to say; after all, chucking water-filled balloons at innocent strangers isn't the best way to spend her morning. But if Sam calls for it, she'll have it. There must be _something_ to it.

"Watching the faces is nice," Sam remarks in return, cheek against a warm, pulsing neck.

"Heh," Cat muffles a childlike giggle as she observes some misfires bounce contemptibly off pigeons and their feeders, "that's a funny sound."

The blonder, taller and less accustomed one eyes her friend with just that bit of envy, coveting the skewed outlook and perspective towards everything. Cat has an eyeglass different from the rest of such in the world. Either that or everyone's with convex and concave ones and Cat's been born without anything resting upon her cheekbone.

"Come now," Sam lifts her companion off the ground in a princely and civil gesture, letting the girl place her bum comfortably upon a ledge, following immediately afterwards.

The two dangle their feet from the edge, legs feeling the magnetic pull from the workings below, unseen by the human eye. As Cat almost lurches forth, Sam catches her wrists and thumbs the knobbly bits on the thinner scale, dragging the redhead into her abode, ensconced and content.

Seconds later the frisky Cat is tiptoeing on the ledge, frolicking along the beam like an unlearned gymnast with both arms outstretched. Sam, less acrobatic and much less coordinated, only holds a curved hand on the outer lane, watching the thin limbs take the narrow road in their stride.

"What now, that the 'morning rush' is over?" Cat asks, stepping down with a lighter spring within her step.

Samantha deliberately hooks her chin into the shoulder-blade on the left and rakes her gaze across. The pink has brightened and the thickening luminescence of a blinding yolk approaches brazenly from beneath stacks of clouds, pancakes to Cat.

"Anything we want at all."

The day is spent as both like, with much compromise.

Cat takes Sam on a tandem-bike ride, having the handles under the sweaty grip of her fingers as spokes press heated and grooved rubber into gravel. Sam only wishes she could keep up. Sam puts down four burgers for each of the pair and takes out a stopwatch. Cat has a try at stuffing her face with fast food. Sikowitz stops by for a randomised acting challenge. Sam tosses ketchup in his face, which he cleans off with his tongue, develops some form of temporary amnesia and moves on to Tori, who flees down the street. Cat draws Sam towards her favourite playground where they go on the swings multiple times, Cat plays 'house' and Sam puts graffiti under the plastic yellow slide. Sam brings her to the largest amusement park in Los Angeles and reduces her ability to hear by at least thirty percent by taking Cat down the coaster with a G-force to kill.

And then Cat asks for the last alternate, but it is two hours to midnight and Sam says no.

But they take on the helmets, black and red, and take off down the emptier alleyways, leaving the day as dust. Cat has her face in the folds of Sam's leather jacket and hunches, hackles rising from the cold shots of breeze and icicles sure to freeze sanity.

An audacious attempt at getting into an accident with another garbage truck is made when Cat lets out a shriek in the highest velocity of winds. Sam almost swerves herself up onto the riddled roots of a tree, but curbs her vehicle and they find themselves crooked into the shaking of trees ready for autumn and then winter.

The leaves, mostly green, start their descent. Some are rusted brown and a few show hints of a mellow yellowing. Thrown from the seats, the pair is cupped under the walkway of flora and the hidden fauna. Sam's fingers are splayed upon Cat's abdomen, placing light pressure on the perceptibly frailer body against her own. In the distance they spot the turning that takes them to the brighter street they call the neighbourhood. The street lamp nearest flickers and the rest are dots from above, connecting them would lead to some shut-eye.

"I'd like a shower," Sam grunts.

"First time for everything," Cat makes an uncharacteristically sarcastic statement, although it was meant to only be factual in tone.

"Right."

"I can feel you there."

"Hmm?" Sam responds in the most guiltless manner possible, wiling her way into conditioning Cat to believe the less-than-real.

"I can feel your hand."

Sam's unoccupied hand has found a hobby, digging into Cat's pockets and scouring for that phone so she may change 'Sam Puckell' to 'Sam Puckett' within Cat's ambiguously compiled list of contacts. Upon not finding the blasted gadget, Sam takes her palms to stroke at Cat's sides.

"Are you cold?"

Cat tunnels her way into Sam again and Sam doesn't want the answer then. Would it be so disgusting and revoltingly selfish of her to hold Cat with her for just about half an hour before allowing her the warmth and soft cushioning of her mattress? Would it be just that sinful to relieve herself of what she'd been holding in for her lifespan? And then, would it be audacious if she suddenly felt like positioning her lips strategically near Cat's?

All of it would be repulsive. Within the dusty gossamer of Sam's mind the female is frightfully aware of every precipice she can topple from. She can be impaled by the sharpened apex of friendship's territorial boundaries. She can be dissected by the thin blades of trust and puppy-eyes, all resplendent in Cat's ever-confounding magnificence.

Yet Cat is simple and unnoticed. Well, not so when she ordered half the public tub of ice-cream from a confectionary. But Sam adhered to her own sets of rules to judge herself by and left the strawberry bits to her friend and the vanilla to her own spoon. She didn't appreciate the idea of sharing though she usually would have licked the stick of a corndog a homeless beggar had eaten off.

Now the leaves were in transition as she prayed she would be too.

Before the trees went completely bare she would tell her. Just a few months. Just a bit more and it would be summer. Then she would see the magic of lost autumns and the quiet, tingling sensations of a cold-but-shaken winter.

"I had a nice time today," Cat says, nose fitting well into the outline of Sam's jaw.

"Really?"

"Mmhmm."

"Hold that thought. I'm not done."

AN: Hello there all. I haven't exactly spoken at all as an author. I'm of a quieter sort, but do ask me questions if necessary and yes, thank you very much for the reviews. They are indeed greatly appreciated and always cared for. Do leave one if possible and if not, thank you for bothering to read my writing. Suggestions are always welcome. I do also write on Naomily and Keffy. I'll be expanding the genre as I see fit. Once again, thank you for reading and do speak to me for fun or whatnot.

-chakramrain


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